Alice Munro’s peerless ability to give us the essence of a life in often brief but always spacious and timeless stories is once again apparent everywhere in her new collection. In story after story, she illumines the moment a life is forever altered by a chance encounter or an action not taken, or by a simple twist of fate that turns a person out of his or her accustomed path and into a new way of being or thinking.

Alice Munro’s peerless ability to give us the essence of a life in often brief but always spacious and timeless stories is once again apparent everywhere in her new collection. In story after story, she illumines the moment a life is forever altered by a chance encounter or an action not taken, or by a simple twist of fate that turns a person out of his or her accustomed path and into a new way of being or thinking.

Alice Munro’s peerless ability to give us the essence of a life in often brief but always spacious and timeless stories is once again everywhere apparent in this brilliant new collection. In story after story, she illumines the moment a life is forever altered by a chance encounter or an action not taken, or by a simple twist of fate that turns a person out of his or her accustomed path and into a new way of being or thinking. A poet, finding herself in alien territory at her first literary party, is rescued by a seasoned newspaper columnist, and is soon hurtling across the continent, young child in tow, toward a hoped-for but completely unplanned meeting. A young soldier, returning to his fiancée from the Second World War, steps off the train before his stop and onto the farm of another woman, beginning a life on the move. A wealthy young woman having an affair with the married lawyer hired by her father to handle his estate comes up with a surprising way to deal with the blackmailer who finds them out.

While most of these stories take place in Munro’s home territory --- the small Canadian towns around Lake Huron --- the characters sometimes venture to the cities, and the book ends with four pieces set in the area where she grew up, and in the time of her own childhood: stories “autobiographical in feeling, though not, sometimes, entirely so in fact.” A girl who can’t sleep imagines night after wakeful night that she kills her beloved younger sister. A mother snatches up her child and runs for dear life when a crazy woman comes into her yard.

Suffused with Munro’s clarity of vision and her unparalleled gift for storytelling, these tales about departures and beginnings, accidents and dangers, and outgoings and homecomings both imagined and real, paint a radiant, indelible portrait of how strange, perilous, and extraordinary ordinary life can be.

Margo Solovei is a brilliant young writer-director who has rejected her rabbinical father’s strict Jewish upbringing to pursue a career in the arts. When an Australian multibillionaire promises to finance a movie about Moses if the script meets certain standards, Margo does everything she can to land the job, including a reunion with her estranged first love, an influential lawyer with whom she still has unfinished business.

Margo Solovei is a brilliant young writer-director who has rejected her rabbinical father’s strict Jewish upbringing to pursue a career in the arts. When an Australian multibillionaire promises to finance a movie about Moses if the script meets certain standards, Margo does everything she can to land the job, including a reunion with her estranged first love, an influential lawyer with whom she still has unfinished business.

For more than 50 years, legendary author Herman Wouk has dreamed of writing a novel about the life of Moses. Finally, at age 96, he has found an ingeniously witty way to tell the tale in THE LAWGIVER, a romantic and suspenseful epistolary novel about a group of people trying to make a movie about Moses in the present day. The story emerges from letters, memos, emails, journals, news articles, recorded talk, tweets, Skype transcripts, and text messages.

At the center of THE LAWGIVER is Margo Solovei, a brilliant young writer-director who has rejected her rabbinical father’s strict Jewish upbringing to pursue a career in the arts. When an Australian multi-billionaire promises to finance a movie about Moses if the script meets certain standards, Margo does everything she can to land the job, including a reunion with her estranged first love, an influential lawyer with whom she still has unfinished business.

Two other key characters in the novel are Herman Wouk himself and his wife of more than sixty years, Betty Sarah, who, almost against their will, find themselves entangled in the Moses movie when the Australian billionaire insists on Wouk’s stamp of approval.

As Wouk and his characters contend with Moses and marriage, the force of tradition, rebellion, and reunion, THE LAWGIVER reflects the wisdom of a lifetime. Inspired by the great 19th-century novelists, one of America’s most beloved 20th-century authors has now written a remarkable 21st-century work of fiction.

For years the drifter haunted the background of American life, roaming the side streets and highways that crisscross this vast country. That all changes when he witnesses a brutal assault on a young woman. By the time he reaches her, the assailant is gone, leaving a trail that is all too easy to follow. But playing the good Samaritan may be more trouble than it’s worth, when his moment of conscience hurls him into a shadowy world of violence, intrigue and deception.

For years the drifter haunted the background of American life, roaming the side streets and highways that crisscross this vast country. That all changes when he witnesses a brutal assault on a young woman. By the time he reaches her, the assailant is gone, leaving a trail that is all too easy to follow. But playing the good Samaritan may be more trouble than it’s worth, when his moment of conscience hurls him into a shadowy world of violence, intrigue and deception.

They call him “Cuchillo,” the Knife. Not because he kills with a blade --- he has plenty of men to do that kind of work for him --- but because his mind is so sharp. As Mexico’s government wages war on the drug cartels, it takes brains to survive, and Cuchillo has not just survived --- he has prospered. But when Cuchillo begins to cut too deeply, the federal police of both the United States and Mexico step in to dull his blade.

They call him “Cuchillo,” the Knife. Not because he kills with a blade --- he has plenty of men to do that kind of work for him --- but because his mind is so sharp. As Mexico’s government wages war on the drug cartels, it takes brains to survive, and Cuchillo has not just survived --- he has prospered. But when Cuchillo begins to cut too deeply, the federal police of both the United States and Mexico step in to dull his blade.

Monty Danforth finds the tin buried beneath a shipment of leather-bound classics. Inside is a millennia-old vellum manuscript written in an unfamiliar but unmistakably ancient language. Danforth tries to photocopy and photograph it, but he ends up with blank images, as though the ink were made of something impervious to modern technology. As the scroll’s mystery enchants him, this hapless bookseller falls into a cutthroat conspiracy that he may never escape.

Monty Danforth finds the tin buried beneath a shipment of leather-bound classics. Inside is a millennia-old vellum manuscript written in an unfamiliar but unmistakably ancient language. Danforth tries to photocopy and photograph it, but he ends up with blank images, as though the ink were made of something impervious to modern technology. As the scroll’s mystery enchants him, this hapless bookseller falls into a cutthroat conspiracy that he may never escape.

Monty Danforth finds the tin buried beneath a shipment of leather-bound classics. Inside is a millennia-old vellum manuscript written in an unfamiliar but unmistakably ancient language. Danforth tries to photocopy and photograph it, but he ends up with blank images, as though the ink were made of something impervious to modern technology. As the scroll’s mystery enchants him, this hapless bookseller falls into a cutthroat conspiracy that he may never escape.

Soon a dead-eyed old man and his granddaughter come calling for the scroll. Danforth refuses to sell them the manuscript, but they will not be the last to demand it. Powerful forces crave the secrets locked within this ancient document, and Danforth will survive only if he can master its power.

The narrator’s father has died, and his only inheritance is a heavy, leather-bound book. He has never seen it before and has trouble believing that his brutal, ignorant father ever touched something so beautiful. But the volume is well-thumbed, full of aphorisms and advice written in the dead man’s hand. Soon after he reads it, the son finds his life spiraling out of control. If he doesn’t want to follow Daddy to the grave, he had best heed the lessons of the book.

The narrator’s father has died, and his only inheritance is a heavy, leather-bound book. He has never seen it before and has trouble believing that his brutal, ignorant father ever touched something so beautiful. But the volume is well-thumbed, full of aphorisms and advice written in the dead man’s hand. Soon after he reads it, the son finds his life spiraling out of control. If he doesn’t want to follow Daddy to the grave, he had best heed the lessons of the book.

Lyle and Juan are thugs who take Paul Parker hostage. Once a fine lawyer, Parker’s enthusiasm has slipped with age, and criminals like Lyle are part of the reason for his disillusionment. Years after they last saw each other in court, Lyle is convinced that Parker owes him something. At gunpoint, Lyle and Juan make Parker lead them to the old Angler ranch, to open up a hidden library whose volumes hold the secret to forgotten riches, and the strangest war profiteering scheme to ever come out of the Great Plains.

Lyle and Juan are thugs who take Paul Parker hostage. Once a fine lawyer, Parker’s enthusiasm has slipped with age, and criminals like Lyle are part of the reason for his disillusionment. Years after they last saw each other in court, Lyle is convinced that Parker owes him something. At gunpoint, Lyle and Juan make Parker lead them to the old Angler ranch, to open up a hidden library whose volumes hold the secret to forgotten riches, and the strangest war profiteering scheme to ever come out of the Great Plains.

Madeleine L’Engle is best known to the world as the author of A WRINKLE IN TIME. But to those who knew her well, L’Engle was much more: a larger-than-life persona, an inspiring mentor, a strong-willed matriarch, a spiritual guide, and a rare friend. Renowned literary historian and biographer Leonard S. Marcus reveals L’Engle in all her complexity through a series of incisive interviews with the people who knew her most intimately.

Madeleine L’Engle is best known to the world as the author of A WRINKLE IN TIME. But to those who knew her well, L’Engle was much more: a larger-than-life persona, an inspiring mentor, a strong-willed matriarch, a spiritual guide, and a rare friend. Renowned literary historian and biographer Leonard S. Marcus reveals L’Engle in all her complexity through a series of incisive interviews with the people who knew her most intimately.

Madeleine L'Engle is perhaps best recognized as the author of A WRINKLE IN TIME, the enduring milestone work of fantasy fiction that won the 1963 John Newbery Medal for excellence in children's literature and has enthralled millions of readers for the past 50 years. But to those who knew her well, L'Engle was much more besides: a larger-than-life persona, an inspiring mentor, a strong-willed matriarch, a spiritual guide, and a rare friend.

In LISTENING FOR MADELEINE, the renowned literary historian and biographer Leonard S. Marcus reveals Madeleine L'Engle in all her complexity, through a series of incisive interviews with the people who knew her most intimately. Vivid reminiscences of family members, colleagues, and friends create a kaleidoscope of keen insights and snapshop moments that help readers to understand the many sides of this singularly fascinating woman.